


Uranium Fever

by insanedairyfarmer



Series: FO4/GB AU [2]
Category: Fallout 4, Ghostbusters (2016)
Genre: F/F, Fallout 4 AU, I certainly do, because who doesn't love Holtz and plasma weapons?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-12
Updated: 2019-04-16
Packaged: 2019-04-21 20:38:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,912
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14292972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/insanedairyfarmer/pseuds/insanedairyfarmer
Summary: Erin takes Holtzmann to clear out a Pre-War mine.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to everyone for your kind comments. This is one of the nicest fandoms I've ever been a part of.
> 
> I wasn't going to write more of this (mainly due to lack of inspiration from Fallout 4, which, let's face it, isn't the best Fallout game ever) but I recently finished Fallouts 2 and 3, which definitely helps with world building. (Also, how the hell does VATS work? Who knows?)
> 
> This is part 1 of 2. I'm still writing Part 2, but I'm actually writing, which is a nice change.

“I’m the mother fucking mailman!”

Erin stuck her head out the window and watched as Holtzmann fired the plasma rifle, frying a trio of raider mannequins that a settler had put together. A smile crossed her face as Holtzmann yelled and stomped in a circle, waving her weapon.

“Hey!” Erin waved to the Courier, and Holtzmann waved back. “Come take a look at this.”

Erin moved to the wall of the house as Holtzmann stuck her head in the window, and watched as Erin pointed to the map painstakingly painted on the wall.

“This here,” Erin gestured to a location on the north-east of the map, “is Dunwich Borers. Was a marble quarry pre-war, and now raiders have taken it over. I'm going to clear it out, you want to come with?”

Holtzmann nodded. “For sure. Lemme get prepped. Ammo to make, all that.”  
“I wanted to head out tomorrow, so that works. You worn power armour before?”  
Holtzmann shrugged. “Yeah. Never needed it. Bullets bounce off that leather stuff. It's dumb.”

-

Two weeks, Holtzmann had been in Sanctuary. In the two weeks, she'd turned a plasma pistol into a flamethrower, charmed half the settlers, and then converted her flamethrower into a sniper rifle. It had been hung on the wall with the others.

Erin had built a new water purifier (“Oh, like Project Purity? So all that guy had to do was build one? Huh.”) and repaired one of the old houses. Turns out they weren't as flame resistant as previously thought.

The X-01 suit softly _bipped_ when Erin got in. A fresh Fusion Core was in the back, and the newly upgraded helmet provided her with a heads up display that outlined living creatures. _Useful_.

Holtzmann was already waiting when Erin lumbered to the Sanctuary Hills sign. She'd opted to leave her quad-barrel missile launcher in Erin’s strongbox, instead carrying her plasma rifle and a backpack full of grenades. Erin had counted at least ten, and those were only the ones she'd made last night. At _least they're not Nuka-Grenades_.

“All set?” Holtzmann arched an eyebrow while Erin patted the gatling laser she was hefting.  
“All set. You?”  
“Yup. Got lots of big bangs and small poofs. It'll be great.”  
“Nice.” Erin pointed to the east. “We go that way.” Her eyes widened as Holtzmann slung the plasma rifle over her shoulder and jumped into the river. “Jesus, Holtzmann!”

It was a long trek to Dunwich Borers, and Holtzmann dried off relatively quickly under the unrelenting Commonwealth sun. Erin was questioning Holtzmann about the Mojave.  
“What’s New Vegas really like?”  
Holtzmann snorted. “It’s a shithole. I mean, sure, the lights are bright and girls are cheap, but it’s the same in New Reno. Only difference is that the Reno slots are rigged.” She quickly fiddled with the Pip-Boy on her arm, and turned her attention back to Erin. “Vegas doesn’t have the dirty side of Reno. I mean, sure, you have the Omerta gangster bullshit, and the White Glove society used to be cannibals. Reno is much the same.” Holtzmann pointed to a pre-war park bench, and proceeded to flop along its length while Erin stood uncomfortably. “But, New Reno is home, so there’s that.” She sat up, while Erin watched for Mirelurks in the small lake. “How you doing over there?”  
“Just fine.” Erin was not ‘just fine.’ The power armour was hot, no matter what air conditioning system the U.S Military had designed, but she wasn’t going to admit that to Holtzmann, who sat happily in her leather armour. “This suit has air conditioning.”  
“I’ll bet.” Holtzmann stretched her arms and yawned. “Betcha remember when that was made?”  
Holtzmann’s tone wasn’t nasty, but Erin bristled anyway. “Before the bombs fell, thank you.”  
“Hey, come on.” Holtzmann held out her hands. “I didn’t mean that in a bad way. Just, ya know, makin’ a joke,” as she held up a hand to shelter her eyes from the sun. “Because you’re two hundred and forty five years old, and that’s entertaining for me. I was trapped in the Sierra Madre casino five years before you woke up. That’s wild.”

Erin remembered the advertisements for the Sierra Madre, the countless radio jingles boasting of its grand gala opening. Dean Domino and Vera Keyes were the headline acts, and Erin hadn’t thought about them since 2077. Holtzmann dug a casino chip from her pocket and flicked it to Erin, smiling, and said “it’s not about finding it. It’s about letting go.”

Erin carefully held the chip in her armoured fingers, and gestured with the other hand. “Tell me about it.” She pointed to the south east, along a partially intact road. “Come on, let’s get moving.”

Holtzmann told Erin about the Mojave, and Erin shared stories of the Commonwealth as they walked. Erin learned about New Vegas, the Legion, and the NCR. (“They’ll never expand this far. They had enough trouble trying for Vegas!”) As they passed The Slog, Erin recounted the tale of the Institute. While it was still painful, remembering her son, she hoped she had done the right thing, and Holtzmann agreed. “I heard about an escaped synth, in the Capital wastes. That turned into a right mess, apparently. Someone told him who he really was, and then poof! Blood everywhere.”

“We’re close.” Erin dropped into a crouch, Holtzmann following suit. “Stay here for a minute, and tune your Pip-Boy to Radio Freedom. It’s about halfway on the range.” While Holtzmann fiddled, Erin crept closer and pulled out an artillery flare. She could hear a raider complaining about his Jet, so she uncapped the flare and threw it as hard as she could towards the pit.

The flare sailed over the edge, and Erin waddled back to where Holtzmann had stayed, hearing the music. “Now wait.” A blue cloud of smoke quickly drifted upwards from the pit.  
“ _We see your smoke, General! Preparing to fire for effect!_ ” Erin stood up and sprinted back towards the river, Holtzmann hot on her tail.

Holtzmann heard the whistling first. Wide-eyed, she watched the mortar shell fly over their heads, and crash down into the pit. A raider screamed, and a second shell exploded near a cabin, sending a man’s arm flying towards their position. The third shell followed the first, and Holtzmann guessed that it must have hit a gas tank or something, because the explosion rocked the ground.

The last shell fell short again, pulverising the armless raider and causing the cabin to collapse. Erin faintly heard the _“Anything left is all yours”_ as she hoisted Holtzmann up and lumbered towards the edge of the pit. Her visor showed five live raiders at the bottom of the pit, and three on the staircase.

“Holtzmann. I’m going to jump down there-” Erin indicated the bottom of the pit “- and take care of those raiders. You get the ones on the stairs.”  
“You fucking _what_?” Before Holtzmann could grab her, Erin had flung herself off the cliff.

 _Guess the east coast military did something right._ As Erin’s feet hit the ground and the _IMPACT COMPENSATION_ light flashed, the explosive vents activated and set fire to a wide-eyed raider. He screamed and ran for his friend, who shot at Erin instead of focusing on his flaming comrade coming at him. Erin sidestepped the bullet, and hoisted her gatling laser, aiming at a third raider who was halfway behind a block of stone.

 _Easy does_. The origins of VATS had been lost in time, and Erin mourned for it as her viewpoint shifted. The raider’s right leg was closest, so she sighted for that, and relaxed as the X-01 suit took over. The laser spun up and fired, and the raider’s leg was blown off. VATS shut off and Erin watched as the first two raiders screamed and tried to extinguish themselves.

Holtzmann took care of the three raiders on the staircase, and managed to hit one on the ground with a plasma grenade. Two of them had finally burned out, and the one with the missing leg had dragged himself away, leaving Erin and Holtzmann standing before the mine entrance.

“Not creepy at all.” Holtzmann reloaded the plasma rifle, mumbling, while Erin simply stood and stared into the hole. “Nope, not even a little bit, nope.”

The interior of the mine was pretty standard, or so Erin thought. She hadn’t been in many Pre-War marble quarries. There was a lot of stairs and well-equipped Raiders, and she’d found a computer detailing ‘the horrors within’. Erin figured there were some feral ghouls down there. Unpleasant, but they could be dealt with. As Holtzmann rifled through the leaders loot chest, Erin examined a door that had been chained shut. The wood was dented inwards, and a sheet of metal had been poorly attached to the bottom of the frame. Erin grabbed it and pulled, the power armour augmenting her strength, and flung the metal behind her, almost taking off Holtzmann’s head. While the Courier laughed, Erin pulled the heavy metal chain from the door and tried the handle.

“Not gonna work. Frame is warped.” Holtzmann smacked her hand against the wood. “I can get it open. Easy peasy, just a medium poof.”  
“I’d rather not.” Erin lifted her right foot and drove it through the weakened material, and the door swung open with a reluctant whine. “Let's do this.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> URAAAAAAAAAAAAAANIUM FEVER
> 
> Sorry for the delay. This has been rolling around my head for months and I finally got it down. My brain doesn't work so good nowadays so it was a bit of a struggle.
> 
> EDIT: and over a year after I posted the first chapter! Good lord.

‘The horrors within’ didn't even begin to describe what they found. While Holtzmann fiddled with the first power lever, the ten feral ghouls hiding in the side passages flooded them. Erin punched the face right off the first one, and the musty air was soon inundated with the stench of burning plasma and long dead flesh. 

 

When Holtzmann opened the first door, Erin gaped as blue eyes rolled back and Holtzmann collapsed to her knees, crawling forwards, curling into a ball just under another power lever. The lights shut off with a thump of  _ doom, doom,  _ and the eyes of Erin’s helmet lit up, as a feral ghoul slid off a marble shelf and rushed towards her. Quickly dispatching it, she knelt besides Holtzmann and helped her sit up, leaning against the power pole.

“Flashback. Men sitting in those things. Diggers? Saw them in Redding. Bright lights. So clean.” She took the bottle of water Erin handed to her, still babbling. “Stay in the light. Stay in the light.  _ Stay. In. The. Light _ .” 

Erin reached above Holtzmann’s head and pulled the power lever, bathing the area in bright lights and stopping the Courier’s rambling in its tracks. Erin helped her to her feet and pointed to a corridor to their left. Holtzmann shook her head.

“I’m just going to stay here for a minute. Come back and get me.” A weak smile appeared briefly, and Erin carefully squeezed her shoulder before heading up the slight incline.

 

When Erin flipped the power switch, two ghouls crawled out from under the storage shelves. She raised the Gatling laser, barrel spinning, when she heard Holtzmann scream.

 

Four ghouls had staggered to their feet, and Holtzmann leaned against the pole, plasma rifle pointed at the ground. Erin sprinted straight into the first one, knocking it away, and spun to face the rest, the gatling whirring and spitting out red beams. From the corner of the HUD, she saw a green streak flash by, and Erin dropped the Gatling laser and stepped back.

 

The plasma grenade fried the remaining ghouls, and Holtzmann choked out a laugh. “Did you break your laser?”

Erin shook her head, and picked it up. The power cable was damaged, but that was a simple fix. The Gatling itself was fine, so Erin shucked the power supply from her back and gently set the cannon down. “I'll come back for it.”  _ Hopefully.  _ She helped Holtzmann to her feet, steadying her as she wobbled, keeping a hand close. Holtzmann shakily sipped her water, splashing a little on her hands to wipe her face. 

 

“We can go back.” Erin had no idea what they had walked into. “It’s not that far.”  
  
“No.” Holtzmann shook her head. “Those settlers needed your help, right? Wouldn’t be fair to them if we just left. I’ll be fine.” She drank the rest of her water. “See? I’ve even stopped shaking.” She held up a hand, rock steady, and Erin shook her head.

“The mine isn’t going anywhere. And I’d hazard a guess that the raiders won’t be coming back. We can come back.”  
  
The Courier scowled. “No. We need to finish this.  _ I  _ need to finish this.”

 

Erin had found an old double-barreled shotgun, and deemed it an acceptable replacement for her Gatling laser. The Station Five circuit breaker attracted more ghouls, and Erin wouldn’t admit it, but she  _ enjoyed  _ blasting the ferals with the old shotgun. It almost made her feel like she was in an ancient first-person shooter. Station Four gave them a holotape about new equipment, and Holtzmann fiddled with the terminal as Erin trudged down a gentle slope towards an opening in the cave wall. A bright flash overcame her, and she sat down heavily as a vision of - a temple? - assaulted her vision. She heard Holtzmann yell, and sprint towards her, but the Sole Survivor could only stare at the kneeling children in front of her, and the much older man standing at the altar. The heady tang of burning plasma invaded her skull, and Erin shook herself from the flashback, seeing only dead ghouls and a deep pool of water where the altar had stood.

 

“Down there. It’s down there.” Erin pointed to the hole. “ _ It’s down there. _ ”

Holtzmann squatted beside her, hand resting on top of the suit’s helmet, and tapped lightly. “Erin, babe, what’s down there?”

“ _ It’s  _ down there.” Erin found herself becoming more and more agitated. “The  _ thing _ ! What they wanted!”

“Okay, okay. I get you.” Holtzmann straightened and took a deep breath, counted to four, and then let it go. “Can you stand at all?” When Erin shook her head, Holtzmann shivered.  _ Too cold down here for this _ . She approached the fracture, pushed the button on a plasma grenade, and dropped it into the water. She could just make out a flash of green as it detonated, giving her a rough idea to the depth of the hole. Looking up, she spotted a decent length of chain attached to a pylon, and quickly shimmied up the iron beam to retrieve it. 

 

“Okay, Erin, sweetheart, here’s what we’re going to do.” Holtzmann uncoiled the chain. “I’m going to give the end of this to you, okay?” She waited for Erin’s nod. “So you hold onto this. I’ll have the other end. If I pull it twice, I want you to pull me back up. Can you do that?”

“Are you going somewhere?” The voice module of the X-01 didn’t help dictate emotion, which Holtzmann found eternally annoying.  
  
“I’m going down the hole. I’m going to find what has been causing this - this  _ whatever the fuck this is  _ \- and I’m going to make sure that it won’t happen to anyone else.” With that, Holtzmann gently set her plasma rifle on the ground and threw the end of the chain into the water, gently feeding it down. She handed the other end to Erin, and fished in her pack for Rad-X. Downing two tablets with a mouthful of purified water, she began to strip.

 

The water, as expected was disgustingly cold. Holtzmann swum down, the glow of her Pip-Boy almost blinding her. At the bottom of the pit, she could make out a metal structure, and the opening of another cave. Drawn to the grotto, her light shone upon an altar, with two mini nukes and a strange knife. She gathered the items into her arms, and kicked her way back to where the chain awaited, shifting a nuke to grab the chain and tug it twice. 

 

Erin pulled hard, half leaning against a railing, having shakily found her feet, and gasped a short breath as she saw blonde hair break the surface of the water. Slowing down, she knelt and offered a hand to Holtzmann, only to be handed a mini nuke. Bemused, she put it down on the ground next to her, only to be handed another. 

“Just pull me out, please, Erin, fuckin’ Kaiser but it’s cold in there.” Holtzmann’s lips were tinged with blue as Erin pulled the chain one handed, the other still carefully cradling a nuclear warhead. The Courier sprawled on the unyielding rock as Erin pulled an old shirt from a skeleton, shaking the centuries of marble dust from it before handing it to Holtzmann to dry herself with. 

 

Holtzmann scrubbed herself with the cloth and almost dived back into her leather armour. “Thank you. Now c’mon, let’s make like like the NCR and get the fuck outta Vegas.”

 

They stopped at The Slog on their way back to Sanctuary, Erin heading to a workbench to fix the cable on her Gatling. Holtzmann was soaking up sunlight on a bench, watching her friend.

“My name isn’t Holtzmann.”

Erin poked the cable with a soldering iron. “Oh? What is it then?”

“It’s Jillian.” Holtzmann rested her hands on her stomach as she rolled onto her back. “Jillian Holtzmann.”

Erin rolled the name around her mouth. “Jillian. I like it. It suits you.” She looked over to her friend, golden hair shining in the sunlight, and blurted “it’s beautiful.” 

 

“Like you.”


End file.
